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When we said that Microsoft is aiming for 40% of the entire smartphone market by 2012, there was a bit of the pooh-poohing. Looks like Microsoft is undeterred in setting high goals and, well, good on them. The latest: they're hoping to grow WinMo 50% within the next year:
Microsoft has optimistically announced that it expects at least 50% growth for Windows Mobile in 2008 and 2009 as smartphone sales rise rapidly.
“Fifty percent growth is the minimum,” says Eddie Wu, the software company's managing director of OEM embedded devices Asia.
Microsoft expects to sell 20 million units in the fiscal year ending in June, far higher than the previous year's 11 million.
That actually seems realistic, truth be told. The key issue, though, is that even if Microsoft reaches the goal of increasing Windows Mobile sales by 50%, that doesn't necessarily mean they'll be picking up any market share because of it. See, the smartphone market is still growing and growing fast (having the majority of people on the planet using phones to access the internet in the near future can do that), so everybody is going to be selling more devices.
Its not the story but the picture that grabs me. Who is in the picture? It really cries out for a caption. Here's my take. What's yours? "One day the individual end user will not be alone. He won't be the only one who crashes his PC trying to sync his smartphone. He will look across the cubicles and...KABBAAH...they all will crash. The end user will not be alone. He will have a community. We are bringing the world together."